Participant 7

Guiding Questions:

What are your initial thoughts about the concept of Literacy with ICT (LwICT)?
-This feels like taking another run at something that all teachers everywhere are trying to do - move ourselves and our students into knowledge, then understanding, then analyzing, applying, synthesizing, evaluating... The tools we might use change, the labels are different, but we all know that this is what learning is about, right? So then in some ways, LwICT (I hate acronyms!) doesn't feel new. I guess the "new" is in finding ways to use current technology to accomplish this process better. Since technology will always be changing, then I guess we'll also never be finished with the process of developing LwICT. There will always be ways to teach better than we used to.

What implementation barriers for LwICT do you foresee at Senior Years?
-It is a challenge for me to take 2 days out of my teaching schedule to participate in a workshop (this one!) to find out about this and get "on board"; as with pretty much anything, if I want to become a better teacher, it is going to take time and effort. Of course one of the barriers is that all teachers will need to go through the time and effort to become a part of this. It will be important to streamline the learning process as much as possible, to make it interesting for us to learn about and see the possibilities in our classrooms, and to provide opportunities to learn about this in a formal setting, and also informally on our own.

What opportunities does LwICT present for Senior Years?
-Differentiated learning and collaboration could be implemented more easily than before.

What professional learning is required initially to prepare Senior Years teachers to begin to use the LwICT continuum?

What types of ICT do you currently have in your Senior Years classroom?
-I teach grade 10 science and grade 11 and 12 physics. I use video recording and analysis regularly, audio recording and analysis. We use a Smartboard, students are encouraged to use computers for data analysis. I have been experimenting with websites for posting notes, class videos, supporting files, etc. (http://sites.google.com/site/mrtlehman/).

What types of ICT are available to you in your school, but not in your classroom?

What subjects and grades do you teach and how do you currently use ICT to enhance student learning?